Cornelius Vanderbilt

Cornelius Vanderbilt (27 May 1794-4 January 1877) was an American business magnate and philanthropist who built his wealth in railroads and shipping; he was also the patriarch of the powerful Vanderbilt family. With a net worth of $215 billion in 2016 dollars, adjusted for inflation, he was the richest person in the world during his lifetime, and he was also regarded as one of the most powerful men in the world due to his powerful monopolies and his political influence.

Biography
Cornelius Vanderbilt was born in Staten Island, New York on 27 May 1794, and he quit school at the age of 11 to work at his father's ferry. He later built his own freight and passenger ferry company after purchasing a ship using a $100 loan from his mother, and he was given the lasting nickname of "The Commodore". In 1817, he became the business manager of a New York-New Jersey steamboat company, and he and his family moved to New Brunswick, New Jersey as he ran the large steamboat operation. After his boss' death in 1826, Vanderbilt created his own shipping line company, and he challenged the Hudson River shipping monopoly by using the populist language associated with the Democratic president Andrew Jackson to attack them until they paid him off. In 1847, he took over the New York, Providence, and Boston Railroad, and he bought large amounts of real estate in Manhattan and Staten Island. After the Gold Rush started in California in 1849, he invested in ocean-going steamships, but he could not attract enough investment to build a canal in Nicaragua, which would allow for his ships to cut through Central America en route to the West Coast. In November 1855, he began to buy control of Accessory Transit, hoping to work with the American filibuster and Nicaraguan president William Walker to build a canal through the overland route from Nicaragua's east to west coasts. However, Walker's business allies convinced him to revoke Accessory Transit's charter, so Vanderbilt sent agents to help the Costa Rican army seize Walker's steamships during the Filibuster War of 1856-57. Walker was eventually defeated, but the new Nicaraguan government refused to allow Vanderbilt to restart his transit business, so he started a line by way of Panama and developed a monopoly on the California steamship business. During the American Civil War, he donated his largest steamship, Vanderbilt, to the US Navy, and he was awarded a Congressional Gold Medal. During the 1860s, he bought control of several major railroad companies, including the powerful New York Central Railroad. In 1871, he built the Grand Central Depot in Manhattan, and it later became Grand Central Station. He died in Manhattan in 1877 at the age of 82.